Review #1,341: 'The Godfather Part III' (1990)

The status of The Godfather and The Godfather Part II as two of the greatest movies ever made meant that Part III, made 16 years after the previous instalment, was always going to be in for a rough ride if it turned out to be anything other than perfection. Of course, it wasn't, and the film has since been considered as something of the deformed runt of the litter ever since. 28 years have now passed since director Francis Ford Coppola and writer Mario Puzo drew the curtains on the Corleone family legacy, which is ample time to set aside the anger and frustration generated after the original viewing and reevaluate it objectively. Is it anything near as bad as the film's reputation would suggest? No, not at all.

The story picks up in 1979, with Don Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) seeking legitimacy for his family business and moving out of the murky criminal underworld he has spent most of his adult life dwelling in. To do this, he strikes a deal with Archbishop Gilday (Donal Donnelly) to pay off his astronomic debt in exchange for shares in an international real estate company, making him the largest shareholder as a result. Meanwhile, the bastard son of Michael's brother Sonny, Vincent Mancini (Andy Garcia), has returned home to offer his services, and to justify his beef with the ambitious boss of the Corleone's New York operations, Joey Zasa (Joe Mantegna). Michael agrees to take the young hot-head under his wing, but Vincent starts to develop feelings for his cousin - and Michael's daughter - Mary (Sofia Coppola).

Many of the complaints aimed at the film usually involve the overly bleak tone, a confusing and slow-moving plot, and the performance of Sofia Coppola, and these are all completely justified. Coppola and Puzo's decision to move the main action away from the mob's dirty dealings and their individual attempts to grab power to rambling conversations and business speak with the Catholic Church understandably isolated a huge chunk of the core fan-base. An already-dull story isn't helped when it's difficult to grasp exactly what's going on. And Sofia Coppola really is terrible. Her decision to make the switch from actor to director was the best decision she could have made, and we've had the pleasures of The Virgin Suicides and Lost in Translation as a result. Her relationship with Vincent is key to the movie's themes, but their scenes play out in spectacularly bland fashion.

Yet there is still plenty to savour in The Godfather Part III.  Where it fails in the quieter moments to make its central story involving corruption within the Church remotely engaging, the set-pieces are still immaculately crafted, something of a Godfather staple. The climax gradually builds the tension to an unbearable level, and there's a nice moment during a crowded street festival involving Vincent and Joey. There's also the other performances, with Pacino delivering one of finest of his career, and Talia Shire and Diane Keaton injecting real emotion in their roles of sister and ex-wife, respectively. This is Michael at his most guilt-ridden and tortured, as he reflects on a life built on the blood of others during his savage quest for power, including of course, his own brother Fredo. Pacino really excels here, as he portrays a man distracted by melancholia and seeking any kind of redemption for his past actions. This will always be the unwanted stepchild of The Godfather trilogy, but go into it with an open mind and you may find that it's much better than you remembered.


Directed by: Francis Ford Coppola
Starring: Al Pacino, Diane Keaton, Talia Shire, Andy Garcia, Eli Wallach, Joe Mantegna, Sofia Coppola, George Hamilton, Bridget Fonda
Country: USA

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,149: 'The Godfather Part II' (1974)

Of all the wonderful things that can be said about Francis Ford Coppola's American masterpiece The Godfather (1972), above all else the film is a masterclass in storytelling. It's essentially a classic, romantic story of family, loyalty and the passage of time, undercut with a dark, violent portrayal of what it takes to achieve the American dream. It told a detailed, complex, and often confusing story featuring a large ensemble of characters, but this only matched the complexity of what Coppola was trying to achieve. The director, adapting Mario Puzo's novel, famously had a torrid time at the hands of the producers, namely Robert Evans. Yet when the resulting three-hour epic became a box-office and award-season smash, Coppola would be given free reign if he was to helm a follow-up.

The resulting three hour twenty minute sequel was the director grabbing his chance to have complete control and pouring all of his artistry into it. This wasn't to be another classical Hollywood tale, but one of corruption, greed and pure evil. I first saw The Godfather Part II around 20 years ago at the age of 12 when I was first allowed to start watching movies for grown-ups. Watching it now, having seen it a handful of times in between, it's a completely different movie to the one I remember. I remembered it as an ambitious gangster movie with quite shocking violence, chocked full of great performances by actors who are now giants in their field. What I see now is a sequel truly like no other. A movie that is somehow optimistic and pessimistic in equal measures; one that sees its lead lose his soul while his father gains his; and quite possibly one of the saddest movies ever made.

At first, Part II mirrors the narrative of its predecessor, beginning with a grand wedding as the Don (now Al Pacino's Michael Corleone) makes his underlings sweat as they wait to greet the head of the 'family'. While the previous wedding was a joyous, boisterous occasion, this one is noticeably different. Of the family that remains - John Cazale's weak-willed Fredo; Talia Shire's gold-digging Connie - only the mother seems to be the same. The band doesn't even know any Italian songs. While Michael may have attempted to continue his father's legacy when he took over, the changing, capitalist world has driven him inward, isolating himself from everybody around him and drifting away from the Sicilian values of his father. He was once a proud war veteran with a bright future, but now he is solemn and aggressive, and becomes even more so when a hit on his home almost kills him and his wife Kay (Diane Keaton).

His close brush with death only fuels his paranoia, and he must navigate perilous waters as he moves into business in Cuba with one his father's business associates Hyman Roth (Lee Strasberg), who also happens to be backing a couple of brothers moving into Corleone capo Frankie Pentangeli's (Michael V. Gazzo) territory. Michael suspects a betrayer within his own ranks, suspecting everyone including his own family. It almost seems like a deliberately confusing plot to take in alongside Michael's descent into pure evil, and it may all be too overwhelming had Coppola not chosen to juxtapose this story with one of optimism and nostalgia; that of the young Vito Corleone's escape from a mafia boss in Sicily and his eventual arrival in America. There is infinitely more colour and hope in these moments, and while these scenes may gloss over Vito's own violent journey, it seems like Coppola is making a point about where he feels his country was heading. Of course, these flashbacks are made even more welcome by the astonishing performance from a young Robert De Niro.

The Godfather Part II currently sits in between The Godfather and The Dark Knight as #3 on IMDb's Top 250 list, and while I have little faith in the accuracy of a list that relies so heavily on popularity, it must be one of the most difficult and uncompromising movies in there. I'm actually pleasantly surprised that so many people love it, given the lack of flashy moments of violence the genre is so popular for. It's an experiment that could have gone so horribly wrong, and one that certainly wouldn't have been made outside of the innovative 1970s. Yet Coppola gets everything spectacularly right, from the inspirational casting of the Oscar-nominated Gazzo and Strasberg, to the chilling penultimate scene which sees James Caan's Sonny briefly return. In that final moment we realise that Michael has always been alone, destined to carve his own path, while forever gazing into the past to ponder what could have been.


Directed by: Francis Ford Coppola
Starring: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Robert Duvall, Diane Keaton, John Cazale, Lee Strasberg, Michael V. Gazzo, Talia Shire
Country: USA

Rating: *****

Tom Gillespie